Chelsea and Aston Villa are turning into the Premier League’s greatest swap shop and it looks like the Blues are getting the better deal – but here’s why the trades suit BOTH parties… and how Unai Emery can get the best out of Nicolas Jackson

The name Omari Kellyman probably means relatively little to most Premier League fans yet the young attacking midfielder is a crucial figure in relations between two of its most prominent clubs.

Two summers ago, Kellyman moved from Aston Villa to Chelsea for £19million. It seemed a high fee for a player who had made only six first-team appearances.

Blues academy product Ian Maatsen moved in the opposite direction for £37.5m and has played 91 times for Villa, though he has rarely been first choice at left-back. Kellyman, 20, moved to Strasbourg this month having never played a first-team game for Chelsea.

Summer 2024 was a time of widespread panic about the Premier League’s profitability and sustainability rules, as clubs scrambled to avoid possible points deductions. There is no suggestion of anything untoward on the part of either club, though Villa and Chelsea were warned by UEFA in summer 2025 that they were looking closely at so-called ‘swaps’.

Both are currently on the naughty step with European football chiefs having been fined in summer 2025 and are having to follow strict financial rules.

Which brings us to the current window. Nicolas Jackson’s £65m switch from Stamford Bridge to Villa is the fourth transfer between the clubs since Morgan Rogers completed his £117million move to Chelsea on July 21. Villa need a centre-back before the window closes and as Chelsea have too many, the story may not end here.

At his press conference on Friday, Villa boss Unai Emery said Chelsea and Villa wanted to ‘kill’ each other on the pitch. Off it, though, the clubs seem to enjoy a healthier relationship.

The movers and shakers… 

Villa co-owner Nassef Sawiris and his Chelsea counterpart Behdad Eghbali are decisive operators and if the people in charge can pick up the phone to one another, negotiations tend to move more quickly.

‘Both are operating under UEFA cost control sanctions and have to follow a business plan,’ said football finance expert Kieran Maguire.

‘The two clubs traded Maatsen and Kellyman in 2024 in a deal that made profits for both under Premier League rules, but not those of UEFA.’

Emery, however, gave short shrift to suggestions of co-operation. ‘Good relations?’ he said. ‘The relationship is only through deals for money. They want to kill us, and we want to kill them. We have players and we can sign their players but they’re deals for money and players. They signed Morgan and Emiliano Martinez to kill us.’

At least two weeks before Rogers’ move to Chelsea was announced, Daily Mail Sport understands that that possible transfer was being talked about openly in Premier League dressing rooms.

Similarly, Villa had been chasing wide attackers for much of the summer and had considered Harvey Barnes and Crysencio Summerville, among others. Yet in the end, they took Alejandro Garnacho, a player Chelsea did not want who is now on loan at Villa.

Youngster George Hemmings was preferred to Garnacho in the opening day thrashing at Brighton and the Argentine did not come on until the 86th minute even though Villa were 4-0 down by half-time. With Ibrahim Mbaye, a long-term target, now through the door, Garnacho is competing for spots with Hemmings, Mbaye, John McGinn and Emi Buendia, who can all operate on the flanks.

Though there was tentative interest from Tottenham in Jackson, Daily Mail Sport was told in late July that if the Senegal forward left Chelsea, it would be for Villa. Likewise, when Villa had an Emi Martinez-shaped problem and Chelsea needed a goalkeeper, the next steps were no surprise.

All of this is perfectly within the rules and when clubs are constantly trying to manage UEFA’s often baffling rules, they will pull any legal lever they can. You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours.

Who has the edge?

Looking at these deals with fresh eyes, you would assume that Chelsea were in the Champions League and Villa absent from Europe, not the other way around.

The Stamford Bridge club have taken a World Cup winning goalkeeper and one of the best English attackers from Villa. In return, they have sent them two players they no longer wanted.

Dig a little deeper, though. To follow the business plan imposed by UEFA, Villa needed a big sale and Rogers was by far their top asset. So he went for £117m – problem solved. When Villa signed Zion Suzuki, Martinez looked like he was going to Juventus. That move collapsed and suddenly Villa had three senior goalkeepers, including their highest earner.

Now Chelsea have taken away that burden, while landing a huge upgrade on the shaky Robert Sanchez into the bargain.

According to the Deloitte Money League, Chelsea’s revenue for 2025 was more than £100m greater than Villa’s, and they are highly efficient sellers. Chelsea’s buys may help them win the title.

The reward for Villa is unlikely to be as great, especially regarding Garnacho, and it will soon become clear how much Emery really wanted the 22-year-old.

Last season, Villa took Harvey Elliott on loan from Liverpool only to decide they did not want him, and he was barely played all season so Villa did not have to sign him permanently. There is a similar obligation in Garnacho’s arrangement. Watch this space.

Yet Jackson is a different kettle of fish and may prove the ideal successor to Ollie Watkins. The 25-year-old started well at Chelsea but then-boss Enzo Maresca lost patience with his poor disciplinary record – eight yellow and two red cards in the 2024-25 season. He then struggled to make a significant impression on loan at Bayern Munich, despite scoring eight goals in only 12 league starts.

With Emery, though, it should be different. The pair first worked together at Villarreal and though Emery had left when Jackson really took off, scoring 10 goals in 11 games in 2023 before moving to Chelsea, the connection had been forged. Jackson trusts Emery and vice-versa. Emery likes players who fit into his plans immediately and Jackson should certainly do that.

The hand of Sawiris

Little happens at Aston Villa without the approval of Emery. He has been given free rein to hire the staff he likes and – regardless of the version the club like to push – he has been given a level of control over transfers that few managers have.

It is highly unlikely that Sawiris would allow anything that Emery had vetoed. Yet the Egyptian billionaire is becoming an ever more significant player in European football and this has been noticeable during the window. Daily Mail Sport first revealed on May 1 that Villa wanted Mbaye and the deal was undoubtedly helped by the personal rapport between Sawiris and Paris Saint-Germain chief Nasser Al-Khelaifi.

When Emery was hired in autumn 2022, former chief executive Christian Purslow namechecked Jorge Mendes’ agency, Gestifute, in his opening remarks. Mendes has a good relationship with Emery and had proposed AC Milan forward Rafael Leao to Villa, though the Portugal international ultimately chose the far higher salary on offer at Galatasaray.

Mendes is also believed to have brokered Mbaye’s move to Villa Park and last summer, he is thought to have been involved in trying to find a new club for Martinez – who has now ended up at Stamford Bridge. Not everyone in football is fond of Mendes but given his connections, it makes sense to keep him in your contacts list.

The coming months – indeed, the next 48 hours – will tell us which of these clubs will do better from their trading. Yet with UEFA creating an ever more complicated financial puzzle for clubs to solve, is it really any surprise if occasionally they help one another out?